European Community of Inclusive Culture Erasmus Project

Project Title

European Community of Inclusive Culture

Project Key Action

This project related with these key action: Cooperation for innovation and the exchange of good practices

Project Action Type

This project related with this action type : Strategic Partnerships for adult education

Project Call Year

This project’s Call Year is 2017

Project Topics

This project is related with these Project Topics: ICT – new technologies – digital competences; Key Competences (incl. mathematics and literacy) – basic skills; Creativity and culture

Project Summary

Summary:
The ECIC brought together partners from Italy, France, Spain, Ireland & Portugal to learn together, to transfer innovation & good practice, promoting a new quality mark, “European Community of Inclusive Culture (CIC)” to promote cohesion through culture and the arts. The project targeted disadvantaged participants & their communities.
Partners each organised a Community Learning Workshop event based on different forms of cultural and the arts. Local participants with little experience or no previous interest in the arts were inspired to attend workshops run by partners. Partners followed a common methodology but each concentrated on a different art form. The project used different arts to inspire interest in reading and literacy.

Background/Context:
Access to culture is a right and a responsibility. If we are to meet the challenges of the 21st Century we must harness the talent and creativity of our citizens. Without basic literacy skills people are not able to properly participate in society. (Europe2020, Lisbon Treaty) This project not only helped by teaching basic skills, it encouraged people with newly acquired writing & artistic skills to take part in focused cultural events, endorsing their place in a culturally inclusive world.

Although Europe has one of the highest literacy rates in the world, adult iliteracy still grows but the subject is something of a taboo, while the implications of low literacy for the individual & society are often ignored. This project worked to empower adults with literacy problems by helping them to recognise the power of the written word, supporting them to become creative writers through focused teaching sessions.

The Objectives were:
1. Create a Transnational Partnership to develop innovation & extend knowledge in the field of adult literacy, creative writing & community inclusion. Sharing teaching methodologies, marketing & event promotion skills across the partnership.
2. Help participants increase literacy skills by increasing their writing capacity.
2. Create 5 European “Culturally Inclusive Learning Communities”, building on existing good practice.
3. Work with local organisations in each country to promote creativity & as an empowerment & inclusion tool.
4. Develop language skills to increase literacy skills of participants through joint training workshops & cultural activities.
5. Use celebrated & published writers & artists to inspire others & to demonstrate that “everyone has a book within them!”
6. Create 5 national members the EFFE Houses as Living Museums – each develops the national & EU ECIC Network.

Numbers and profile of Participants
Each transnational partner hosted an event attended by at least 100 local, regional & European participants.

The Methodology used:
Reading needs to be fun and enjoyable so the partners used the focus of Community Learning Events to show how people struggling with low skills can be empowered within inclusive cultural communities.
Participants were encourage to use simple prose, poetry & basic writing to contribute to community events. This was not only empowering, it also opens doors to further, more formal learning. This project enabled all participants, regardless of their initial skills level, to more ably express themselves by the written word.

Each partner worked with a different genre and had a wider interest in the written word through promoting culture as a tool for empowerment, confidence building, community inclusion & personal achievement. Different art forms were used to assist with rehabilitation after a period of mental illness & partners wored together to exchange methodologies around teaching & training for those local people lacking basic skills.

The project developed innovation with regard to life-mentoring, coaching & reading/writing, using local, relevant & fun occasions to deliver basic literacy lessons disguised through music, dance, theatre, film & festival.

Results:
• 1 transnational partnership Learning Platform defining good practice & methodology used to develop “Culture Inclusive Community” label.
– 5 versions (one in each country) Anthology of first work new artists
• 5 Learning Communities created – at least 100 people more able to express themselves in writing at the end of the project.
• Introductions & opportunities for authors & aspiring writers to network & contribute to world literature.

• New European Network “Culture Inclusive Communities” established through focused local cultural events, more inclusive communities promoted through the Network.
• Opportunities for authors & aspiring writers to mix with publishers & critics
• Raised awareness of “Culture Inclusive Community” as a model for sustainable rural development

Impact:
• Economic regeneration, tourism developed linked to cultural identity.
• More than 100 people with increased skills more able to produce written works of their own.

EU Grant (Eur)

Funding of the project from EU: 101055 Eur

Project Coordinator

DUNA DI SALE Associazione & Country: IT

Project Partners

• FUNDACION UXIO NOVONEYRA
• Ó Bhéal Limited
• LitFest.eu Festival de Voulmentin
• ASSOCIAÇÃO ECA – Eventos Culturais do Atlântico